Youth need new skills to fit in job market

Governments and development agencies support youth empowerment programmes as a means of improving developmental outcomes and strengthening institutions and communities through the involvement of young people.

However, in Kenya, most programmes involving young people in the processes that affect them and communities have had little impact on their lives.

For instance, the much hyped revitalisation of Technical Industrial Vocational Education and Training (Tivet), the Trees for Jobs Initiative, the Youth Enterprise Development Fund, Roads 2000 Project, and Kazi Kwa Vijana programmes have contributed little to youth empowerment.

Sadly, the provisions of Article 55 of our Constitution — that the youth should have access to relevant education and training, have opportunities to contribute in political, socioeconomic, and other spheres of life, and have access to employment, among others — also seem to have produced few results. Consequently, many young people lack employable skills, have limited opportunities for gaining a livelihood, and are engaged in crime and drug and alcohol abuse.

The main undoing of our empowerment programmes is lack of in-depth analysis of the state of the youth to appreciate its socioeconomic, cultural, political, and developmental complexity.

Many of these programmes are short-term and do not focus on the psycho-social development of the youth. They have failed to find the means to effectively capture the interest of young people. Most of the programmes lack clear strategies on how to sustainably harness the vast energy of the youth.

Therefore, there is a need for attitude and culture change in order to design programmes that are robust, long-term, challenging, and able to equip the youth with competencies to succeed and contribute meaningfully to the community. 

A viable starting point could be the reviving and revamping of vocational and technical institutions. This would ensure that the youth who enrol in formal Tivet institutions obtain the competencies needed to be successful in SMEs or can easily find employment in the formal sector.

Additionally, Tivet institutions should develop programmes to equip out-of-school youth with practical and legitimate competencies.

All stakeholders should be coordinated to develop specific competencies that are needed at the workplace. Industry owners should be at the forefront in this initiative since they know the qualities that they demand from employees.

This would mean giving industry a central role in the development and implementation of Tivet curricula and would go a long way in eliminating the oft-cited mismatch between formal training and the requirements of employers.

The institutions should also give prominence to skills training that should be focused on developing entrepreneurial competence by emphasising practical application. Additionally, there should be emphasis on life skills training, including personal management, communication, conflict management, as well as decision-making and critical thinking.

If well formulated and implemented, this would create a pool of appropriate skills among the youth, making them competitive in the global economy.

Mr Chiuri is the chief officer, education, ICT, and social development, Laikipia County. [email protected].